


Not So Innocent

by rubyelf



Category: Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff, Hobbit Smut, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-12
Updated: 2012-05-12
Packaged: 2017-11-05 04:55:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/402650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rubyelf/pseuds/rubyelf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After their first time together in "Pippin Asks Too Many Questions" Merry learns a few things about Pippin... including the fact that Pippin's not quite as naive as he might have let Merry think he was... and that's he's got a streak of Tookish thrill-seeker, too.  Sequel to that story but can be read alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not So Innocent

The gardens of Brandy Hall were splendid in the warm twilight, with the fruit trees in full bloom with strings of lanterns hung between them and the sweet fragrance hanging in the air, mingling with the scent of grass trampled under many hobbit feet. Supper had been finished and the tables cleared, and the guests who were not lounging in their chairs digesting the enormous meal had made their way to the clearing near the center of the garden, where the band had struck up a pleasant dance tune with a proper recently-ate-a-lot-of-food tempo. Fine pipesmoke hovered over the tables, and servers moved amongst the guests with mugs of ale, diligent in making certain that no one ever had an empty one. Such hospitality was, of course, expected of the Brandybucks, and many of the lasses had gone to ask for a dance with the handsome young Brandybuck heir, but Merry, uncharacteristically, had turned them all down. 

He’d been sitting at a table under one of the trees, nursing a mug of ale and waving off the servers that tried to bring him more, lighting his pipe and forgetting to smoke it, as he watched his cousin. Pippin was young and he was the heir to a family even more important than Merry’s; he was bright-eyed and innocently charming, and his cheeks had a flush to them that told Merry he was one or two mugs of ale past tipsy, and his sisters, particularly socialite Pearl, had spent most of the evening directing pretty lasses into his arms for another dance. Merry could hear a few of the elder ladies murmuring approvingly about what a fine lad the young Took had become, and what a charmer he was, dancing cheerfully with a lass in one arm and a mug of ale in the other hand. Merry had been watching him and waving off anyone who tried to join him, but somehow Pippin had disappeared from among the dancers a few minutes before, and Merry was scanning the crowd, beginning to feel a bit anxious, when he heard a familiar voice. 

“Merry! There you are!”

He turned and sighed; it was Marigold Hayward, a strikingly pretty lass who’d been one of Merry’s favorites for a while, but she’d gotten some sense into her head and last he heard had gotten herself engaged to a lad from a good family who was more willing to settle down than a certain Brandybuck. Merry expected her to smile coyly and ask for a dance “for old time’s sake”; it wouldn’t be the first time, and it wouldn’t be the only thing they’d done together “for old time’s sake”, but her expression at the moment was distinctly concerned. 

“Merry, you must come get your cousin!” she said, grabbing him by the arm.

“Pippin? What’s he done?”

“One of my brothers said something, and they probably shouldn’t have said it, but… oh, just come with me!”

She dragged him through the dancing couples, and it didn’t take Merry very long to spot a group of lads gathered around in a circle, and to hear some raised voices, one of which was definitely Pippin’s. He elbowed his way into the circle to find Pippin, fists raised and eyes flashing, facing down one of Marigold’s brothers. Merry wasn’t sure which one; the Hayward boys all looked rather alike, but this was one of the younger ones, not much older than Pippin. 

“Pip!” Merry called, trying to catch his attention. 

Pippin didn’t hear him, or ignored him. The Hayward boy said something Merry couldn’t hear, but it was something that made Pippin’s face turn red, and before Merry could react, his cousin had thrown a punch.   
He caught the Hayward lad on the jaw just hard enough to surprise him, but Pippin wasn’t a farm boy or a fighter, and his opponent blinked, shook off the blow, and returned it with a swinging punch that caught Pippin just above the eye and buckled his knees, dropping him to the well-trodden grass. 

“Pippin!” Merry shouted, pushing and elbowing. The gathering parted easily now, since there was nothing left to see; Pippin clearly wasn’t going to get up and hit back. Merry shot a furious look at the Hayward lad, who gave him a smug grin which lasted only a moment before Marigold grabbed him by the hair and dragged him off with a sharp-tongued lecture on who exactly he thought he was and what the family was going to say about him starting a fist fight at the Brandy Hall spring supper, leaving him much less smug. 

Pippin had managed to sit up, dazed and rubbing at his forehead, where the blow had opened up a cut at the corner of his eyebrow which was now trickling blood down the side of his face. Merry crouched down, ignoring the disapproving expressions of the elders at their tables. 

“Pippin, are you all right?”

Pippin blinked at him, a bit drunk and quite stunned. “Hello, Merry.”

Merry grasped him by the arms and pulled him to his feet. “Come on, Pip, before anyone else starts glaring at you.”

He half-dragged his cousin through the garden and toward the house, finally reaching one of the side doors and slipping inside, away from the noise and music and movement of the party. The house was largely empty, most of the guests and servants still outside, and no one stopped the pair as Merry led Pippin through the vast house and down the hall to his own room. He pulled Pippin in, sat him down in the armchair, and turned to lock the door behind them before returning to his cousin. 

Pippin blinked up at him, his eyes like green fire in the glow from the hearth. Merry frowned and inspected the cut on his forehead, relieved to note that although it was bleeding quite a bit, it was a small gash and no lasting harm was likely to come from it. He found a cloth and a jug of water on the washstand and returned to Pippin, wetting the cloth and dabbing it at the blood drying on the side of his face. Pippin watched him in silence, intently. 

“What in the world were you doing, Peregrin?” Merry demanded finally. 

“I had to hit him,” Pippin murmured. 

Merry frowned and sat back on his heels. “Why? You haven’t hit anyone since you were young enough to fight over toys in the playroom.”

“Because of what he said.”

Merry carefully wiped at the cut, but Pippin didn’t flinch, or even seem to notice; perhaps the quantity of ale he’d consumed had dulled the sting. 

“Pip, you can’t go around punching every lad who says something stupid about you…”

“It wasn’t about me,” Pippin said quietly. “It was about you.”

Merry froze, sitting back to look Pippin in the face. “What?”

“What he said. It was about you.”

Merry continued his work as the water in the jug began to turn reddish, but Pippin’s face was almost clean and the bleeding had slowed to almost nothing. Merry rinsed the cloth again and pressed it to Pippin’s forehead. 

“Hold that there, little one. I think our party’s over for tonight; I’ll get us some night clothes and we’ll put you to bed.”

Pippin grasped his wrist. “You don’t want to know what he said?”

“Probably something rude about me sleeping with his sister. Now…”

“No, Merry.”

Pippin pulled his arm until Merry was between his knees, their faces close together, Pippin’s hands on his biceps, holding him in place. The green of his eyes was very bright and not at all fuzzy now, and it refused to let Merry go. 

“Merry, he said that… he said that he didn’t know why I was off dancing with all those girls, because everybody knew you had already got hold of me and… if the lasses knew you’d rather be with your little cousin than… that it was your fault I…”

“That I corrupted you?” Merry asked softly, stroking his cheek. 

Pippin nodded unhappily. “But you didn’t, Merry. It wasn’t like that… I wanted you…”

“Shh. He’s an idiot, Pip.”

“But if that’s what other people are saying…”

“Pippin, I don’t care what they say about me. They can say whatever they want. I’m a grown lad. I can throw my own punches if I have to, but I’m not going to bother. Half the Shire has probably got some idea what’s going on with us by now, and I don’t think most of them are really very surprised, even if they don’t think much of it.”

“But I won’t have them blaming you for turning me into…”

“Pippin, let them say it. I don’t care.”

Pippin frowned and cocked his head. “But…”

Merry leaned forward and kissed him. “I don’t care what anyone thinks except you. I don’t care what anyone says except you. I don’t care about anyone except you.”

Pippin sighed and pulled away. “Merry, maybe we should…”

“Should what?”

“Maybe we should… stop this.”

Merry’s stomach lurched. “Pippin… if you want to… you can stop it if you want to. But it won’t change anything about how I feel.”

Pippin’s hands tangled in his curls and pulled him closer. 

“I don’t think I could stop it if I wanted to, Merry. I can’t think about anything but you.”

Merry smiled and leaned in again, finding the soft juncture of Pippin’s neck and shoulder and gently pressing his teeth to it, loving to feel Pippin gasp and pull harder on his hair. 

“I can’t think about anything but you either, little love. I haven’t thought about anything else since that night…”

“Mmm… that night…” Pippin murmured. “You know, Merry, you haven’t done anything more than kiss me since then.”

Merry stroked his hair. “I wanted to give you a chance to decide whether it was all a big mistake. Besides, that was an awful lot, for your first time.”

“I want an awful lot more,” Pippin said, sliding out of the chair so he was on his knees, eye to eye with Merry, pulling their bodies together. The immediate result of Pippin’s nearness was an almost complete silencing of any of the higher-functioning parts of Merry’s brain, especially when Pippin pressed his hips against him, making sure he could feel that his cousin was already half-hard through his breeches. 

“Pippin…” he whispered. 

Pippin kissed him with surprising determination, biting his lip sharply. “Does it feel like I thought it was a mistake? Don’t you feel me wanting you?”

“I had noticed that,” Merry murmured. 

“Tell me you want me too.”

“Of course I want you, Pip.”

Pippin kissed him again, dizzying, bewildering. 

“Then take me to bed, Merry.”

Merry attempted to think about it for a moment, but there was no thinking going on; he didn’t think it was possible for any other combination of words to have him so hard so quickly, especially when whispered in that voice that was uniquely Pippin’s, with those soft lips pressed against his mouth as he spoke. He stood and tugged Pippin to his feet, walking backwards toward where he knew the bed was waiting, pulling Pippin with him. They hit the bed and tumbled onto it, rolling over each other until Merry had Pippin pinned underneath him, Pippin’s slender body arching and pressing up against him until he could not contain a low moan of desire. 

“You’re going to kill me, Pippin.”

Pippin smirked. “If all those lasses didn’t kill you, one little cousin won’t do it, I’m sure.”

“A hundred lasses couldn’t melt my brain like you do, little one.”

“I think…”

There was a sharp knock at the door. Both hobbits froze; the voice from outside the door was Saradoc, the Lord of Brandy Hall and Merry’s father. 

“Meriadoc?”

“Yes?” Merry answered, trying to keep his voice even despite Pippin licking and nuzzling at his throat. 

“Is your cousin Peregrin in there with you?”

Now Pippin froze too, his face buried anxiously in Merry’s shoulder. Merry took a deep breath. 

“Why? Are you looking for him?”

“Just tell me if he’s in there, Meriadoc.”

Merry swallowed hard. “Yessir. He’s in here. Did you need him for something?”

“No. I heard about that little stunt of his earlier getting into a fight with one of the Hayward lads, and I won’t have that sort of thing going on at my home.”

“I don’t think he’ll do it again, father,” Merry said. “He got knocked rather hard in the head and he’s had quite a bit to drink. I don’t think he’s feeling very well.”

Silence for a moment, in which neither hobbit dared to breathe. 

“All right, then. You’d best keep him in here tonight and put him to bed. I won’t have old Took complaining I let his son get into trouble.”

“I’ll stay here with him and make sure he goes directly to bed,” Merry said, giving Pippin a sharp look as the younger hobbit stifled a giggle.

“Good. I don’t want to hear anything out of him for the rest of the night. And for that matter, not much out of you, either.”

“Yessir.”

Footsteps padded off down the hall. Merry exhaled sharply and gave Pippin a hard, breathless kiss, surprised to find Pippin trembling. 

“Did he frighten you, Pip?”

Pippin looked up at him, green eyes dark and wild, and Merry realized it didn’t have anything to do with fear; Pippin was squirming under him, his back arching eagerly. 

“That didn’t scare you. It got you riled up,” Merry said, amused. 

Pippin shivered. “I like almost getting caught. It’s… oooh. Please, Merry. I want you…”

Merry giggled and kissed him. “You truly are a Took, aren’t you? Always excited by danger.”

Pippin whined and rubbed himself against Merry. “Please?”

“I like when you beg me.”

“Merry!”

Merry laughed and began stripping off Pippin’s clothes, while Pippin watched him with large eyes. Finally he had Pippin naked, and had intended to undress himself, but he was frozen in astonishment at the sight of Pippin’s body stretched out on the bed, bare and smooth and soft and angular, his pale skin exposed, his eyes bright and a knowing little smile on his face. 

“You’re beautiful, Pippin.”

His cousin blushed. “I’m not. You, Merry… you’re… oh, take your clothes off, please…”

Merry hurried to strip himself bare and climbed back onto the bed, his body immediately electrified by the feeling of Pippin naked against him. 

Another loud knock at the door. Merry’s heart leaped into his throat, but at the same time, he felt Pippin’s cock twitch and harden against his thigh. 

“Hello?”

“Merry? It’s Marigold.”

“Oh.”

“Can I speak to you for a moment?”

“I’m… not decent.”

“Oh. I just wanted to make sure Pippin was all right.”

“He’s fine.”

“And I wanted to ask you something else…”

“Err… I’m a bit tipsy, Mar… can you ask me tomorrow?”

Her tone when she responded was distinctly amused. “Don’t think I haven’t heard that voice often enough to know it, Merry Brandybuck. You’ve got someone in there in your bed, don’t you.”

“Maybe?”

She giggled. “I should have known you wouldn’t spend the night after a party like that alone. Have fun. And whoever else is in there… watch yourself; he’s a terrible rogue and there’s all sorts of liberties he’s liable to take.”  
Pippin muffled a giggle against Merry’s throat. 

“Goodnight, Merry,” she said. 

“Goodnight, Mar.”

Silence for a moment. Then, “Goodnight, Pippin. I’m sorry my brother hit you. And he’ll never say anything like that again, I promise.”

The two cousins stared at each other, wide-eyed, as she walked away. 

“Did that make you more excited or less?” Merry asked. 

Pippin thrust up against him in answer. “Merry, you’re killing me.”

“Honestly, Peregrin. You have no patience at all. I was getting there.”

“Get there faster!”

Merry sat up. “If you’re going to be rude…”

Pippin growled and lunged at him, tackling him back onto the bed. “If you won’t get to it, I will.”

Merry raised his eyebrows. “Aren’t you awfully bold, considering it wasn’t that long ago you were a wide-eyed innocent who didn’t even know how this was done?”

Pippin grinned. “Maybe I knew a bit more than I let on.”

“You… ooh, Peregrin! I ought to…”

“I played it off well, though, didn’t I?”

“You… really? You knew all about…”

“Not all about it,” Pippin admitted. “I did have some ideas… but I couldn’t just crawl into your bed and say, ‘Hello, Merry, want to stick your cock in my…’”

Merry glared at him. “You’re an evil little creature.”

Pippin’s eyes widened. “Are you really upset with me, Merry?”

Merry sighed. “No, little one. I don’t think I could be if I tried.”

Pippin grinned brilliantly and kissed him. “Good. Because I love you.”

Merry shook his head. “I love you too. But you’re an awful, terrible creature.”

“I know,” Pippin said smugly. “And I may be awful and terrible, but you’re naked in bed with me, and wouldn’t it be a shame to waste that opportunity?”

“Well, if you’re not so innocent as you led me to believe, maybe this time I won’t treat you as quite so innocent,” Merry said, grinning. 

“Oooh,” Pippin murmured. “Why don’t you treat me like the awful, terrible creature I’ve been?”

Merry raised his eyebrows. “Peregrin Took, I’m starting to think you’ve got things going on in that little head of yours that would even make me blush.”

Pippin grinned and kissed him. “Let’s find out, shall we?”

“You’re the most devious, underhanded, scandalous hobbit in the world!” Merry said, trying to glare up at Pippin, but this was rather difficult, with both of them being naked and slightly breathless. 

“Of course I am,” Pippin said, grinning. “Didn’t your father warn you about Tooks?”

“He certainly did. But not about anything like this. And I’m still annoyed with you that you didn’t let on…”

Pippin flushed slightly. “I’d heard a lot of things, Merry, and asked a lot of questions… mind you, some of them almost got me slapped by some lasses who didn’t appreciate them… but I’d never actually done any of those things before… I still haven’t…”

Oh, Lord and Lady, Merry thought. Only Pippin could make that instant switch from infuriatingly impudent to wide-eyed and trusting; those green eyes, always so changeable, especially by firelight, stared down at him, their faces only inches apart. Merry finally relented and kissed him. One moment his mouth was soft and yielding , offering Merry anything he wanted, but a moment later he was stealing back the kiss, demanding and eager, pressing Merry back against the pillows and leaving him gasping. 

Abruptly, he drew back, frowning. “Merry, are you all right?”

Merry took a moment to catch his breath. “Oh, Pip… I think so. But you’re going to make me lose my mind.”

“But you like it,” Pippin said, kissing him again. 

Merry kissed him back, then rolled them so they lay side by side, still pressed close together. Pippin’s hands came up to wrap themselves around handfuls of Merry’s golden curls, and Merry slid one hand under Pippin’s head to hold him still for kissing while his other hand slipped over Pippin’s chest. These nipples might not be situated on a pair of round, soft breasts, but they still tightened under his fingers, and when he pinched one, Pippin gave a small gasp and jerked against him. 

“Shh,” Merry said, laughing, as his tongue painted a wet stripe along Pippin’s neck. “There are other folks about.”

He tweaked the other nipple, harder, and kissed Pippin to muffle the squeak that escaped him. His hand slid down over Pippin’s belly, feeling muscles shifting beneath the soft flesh; Pippin had never been a hobbit to sit sedately and watch things happen, and his constant activity had left him more slender than a hobbit lad reaching adulthood was expected to be. Merry had no complaints about this; he traced Pippin’s waist and down to one hip, delighting in the small gasping cries that Pippin muffled against his neck. 

“Shh, little one, or I’ll have to stop.”

“Don’t stop!” Pippin murmured, half plea and half demand. 

“You’re very eager, aren’t you?”

“You made me wait,” Pippin said accusingly. “For weeks.”

“I told you, Pip, I wanted you to give time to think about it.”

“I haven’t had time for thinking. I’ve been too busy pulling myself off, thinking about you.”

Merry chuckled and nipped at his throat. “I’ve done a bit of that too.”

“I know what I want, Merry. I knew what I wanted when I started asking you all those questions, hoping you wouldn’t just laugh at me and tell me to go to sleep… and I haven’t thought about anything else since then. You’re… I’ve always loved you, and we always said we would always be best friends, even when we were married, but I want… I feel like I’m not even a whole person unless you’re with me. I don’t want to ever be away from you. Every night I have to sleep in my own bed I think about how much I want you in it. Or wish I was in yours. Or that we were somewhere else, away, together… please don’t tell me to go away, Merry, and please don’t tell me this isn’t real or you don’t really feel this way… I can’t live without you. I’d only be half-alive. Please, Merry… tell me you mean it?”

Merry sighed and pressed his face to Pippin’s soft cheek. “Maybe they’re right. Maybe I have corrupted you.”

“You made me fall in love with you,” Pippin murmured. “Please…”

“I think I’ve always been in love with you,” Merry said quietly, kissing his cheek. 

He felt Pippin’s smile. “Good.”

Merry’s hand, which had been resting just below Pippin’s navel, began to draw fingers through the soft, tightly curled hair. Pippin made a soft sound low in his throat. 

“Every time I touch myself I pretend it’s your hand on me…”

Merry reached lower, stroked his fingertips up the hard length that twitched at the contact. 

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Please, Merry…”

Merry wanted to play with him for a while longer, but his voice was so desperate, and the sounds he made when Merry’s hand wrapped around him and began to stroke him, were much too wonderful, and once he had started he could do nothing but tighten his hand, increase his pace, trying to see what sounds he could draw out of Pippin, even as he tried to muffle them in the pillow. The last sound was a sharp, wordless exclamation as he thrust into Merry’s hand and left a trail of wet stickiness across both of them. 

He slumped back, breathing hard, and Merry petted his hair and watched with amusement as his cousin attempted to collect himself, his cheeks bright red, stray curls stuck to his forehead. Merry brushed them away and kissed him. 

“Are you all right, Pip?”

“Maybe. Probably. Mph.”

Merry laughed. Pippin giggled. 

“It’d be a miracle if someone didn’t hear you,” Merry said. 

Pippin snorted. “Brandy Hall is big enough that there’s probably no one in any other room on this hall.”

“They could probably hear you in the other halls.”

“Oh, no. I’d have to be much louder than that,” Pippin said, nestling back up against Merry. “And it seems you’ve still got a turn to make some noise.”

“Oh?” Merry asked, raising an eyebrow. “What did you have in mind?

Pippin glanced away for a moment, cheeks reddening. “I… wanted you to do what you did last time.”

Merry shivered. “You mean…”

“Do you want to do that?”

“Of course I want to do that!” Merry exclaimed, rolling Pippin over to pin him to the bed. 

Pippin grinned mischievously. “But I’m very young and innocent, you know. You can’t just be…”

“Don’t you try that again,” Merry warned. 

“Do you have any oil, or…”

Merry reached for the bed-stand and pulled open a drawer, fumbling for the small jar of oil he kept tucked away there, along with a few cloths, for occasions when certain issues needed immediate attention. Pippin giggled. 

“I knew you’d have something like that.”

“Like you never do it,” Merry said, scowling.

“I do it all the time,” Pippin said unrepentantly. “Especially in the past few weeks… now that I know what you can do to me, I have so much more to think about…”

Merry rolled his eyes as he took the lid off the jar and dipped his fingers in it. “A respectable young hobbit should have better things to do than spend all day locked in his bedroom doing that to himself.”

“Yes,” Pippin agreed, giggling, but his eyes were following Merry’s hand closely. “But a respectable young hobbit of my age who hadn’t been corrupted by his dirty-minded cousin would be out finding lasses to do it for him… Merry?”

Merry’s face had changed at this last statement, and Pippin knew him well enough to catch it. “I didn’t mean it, Merry. About you corrupting me. Honestly, I didn’t. I’m the one who came into your bed and asked you to do all those things. You were never anything but good and proper to me… until I asked you not to be.”

Merry had to smile. “My thoughts weren’t always good and proper, love. You don’t know what it did to me, all those nights where you’d climb into bed with me and lay all over me… it was torture.”

“Is that why you were always getting up and going to the washroom?” Pippin asked, eyes widening. 

“Hush,” Merry said, and Pippin giggled, delighted at being able to make Merry blush. 

“Don’t tell me to hush…”

“Then I’ll make you hush,” Merry said, grinning, as one slippery hand slid downward to close around his half-hard length. Pippin squeaked and thrust into his hand. 

“That won’t shut me up, Meriadoc,” he said breathlessly. 

“No, but you did say there were other things you wanted to do.”

“Those things,” Pippin said, green eyes golden-bright in the lantern light, “are even less likely to make me shut up.”

Merry laughed, but his hand was sliding downward, and Pippin gasped and arched up to provide him with easier access to what he was reaching for. Merry occupied himself for a moment spreading the oil from his fingers; then, curious, pressed just enough to push just the tip of one finger inside. 

The effect on Pippin could only be called encouraging; he moaned and squirmed toward Merry, the demand difficult to misinterpret. Merry continued to press his finger until it was as deep as it would go, with Pippin breathing hard and shifting eagerly, until Merry twisted his finger and Pippin squeaked quite loudly and grabbed hard at his shoulder with one hand. 

“Merry… oooh…”

“What is it?”

“Do that again…”

“What, that?”

“Yes… that!”

“Shhh!” Merry warned, kissing him forcefully to silence him. Pippin moaned against his mouth and shifted his hips restlessly. Merry, enjoying having Pippin so entirely at his mercy, carefully slipped a second finger in next to the first, waiting to see if Pippin would tense and shift away, but instead, he gasped and writhed and kissed Merry back in a breathless attempt convince him to continue. 

This was even better than before, being able to watch Pippin’s face as he tormented him. Merry had just begun to think that he had managed to regain control of the entire situation for the first time that evening, but that was just for a moment, before Pippin’s bright green eyes were open and staring at him with a look that said very clearly that he was wrong. 

He had a moment to make a noise of protest before Pippin had squirmed away and, with an agility few hobbits his age could manage, had grasped Merry by the arms and rolled them both once again, pinning his cousin to the bed. 

“What are you doing? I thought you liked that!”

“I did like it,” Pippin said, grinning mischievously. “I liked it so much that I thought it would only be fair if I did it to you.”

Merry’s eyes widened. “I didn’t say I wanted you to…”

“Oh, but you do,” Pippin said, reaching for the jar Merry had set aside. 

Merry was quite a bit stronger than Pippin and had a considerable weight advantage; he could have tossed his slender cousin off at any moment, but instead he found himself laying still, held only by Pippin’s body pressed against his own and by the fire-gold brightness in Pippin’s eyes as he looked down at him. 

“Pip, I don’t know…”

Pippin frowned. “You don’t trust me.”

Merry blinked. “Of course I trust you. I mean… except when I don’t, but that’s when you’re… don’t look at me like that, Pippin.”

“You don’t trust me,” he said unhappily. 

Merry melted. “You’re a devious little creature and you know it… but yes, Pip, I trust you.”

Pippin beamed as if Merry had just given him some sort of great award. “Good.”

Most other hobbits who knew Pippin knew the capricious and unpredictable young hobbit who never seemed to be able to pay attention to anything for more than a minute and never seemed to attend to anything, no matter how serious it might be. Merry was one of the few who knew how intently focused his little cousin could be in moments when something had managed to capture his full interest, how engaged he could be in some task that his whimsical mind had decided was important. Not only, it seemed, did Pippin consider this task tremendously important, but all of his usual quick, darting, impatience had vanished, replaced with a quiet intensity that even Merry wasn’t sure he’d seen before. 

Perhaps, though, nobody had ever told Pippin they trusted him before; “trust” and “Pippin” weren’t two words likely to ever end up in the same conversation, unless it was about whether he could be trusted to do something foolish. Regardless, something told Merry that Pippin had taken this as something very solemn and of great importance, and he forced himself to lay still as Pippin slid down the bed, hands gently pressing Merry’s legs apart. Pippin worked slowly, and Merry could feel those green eyes fixed on his face even when his eyes drifted closed as his body stopped fighting Pippin’s efforts, realizing that nobody but Pippin had ever touched him like this before, and that perhaps no one else ever would, that this belonged to him and to Pippin and that the entire rest of the world had stopped mattering entirely. And Pippin was right; it was good, not just the flashes of sensation that made his back arch and his hands clutch at nothing and his mouth come up with words he didn’t hear, but also the understanding of what it had felt like for Pippin to make himself this vulnerable, allowing Merry to touch him like this. 

After what might have been a long time or no time at all, Pippin drew back, grinning. 

“I think you’re the one they might have heard down the hall, Merry.”

Merry struggled to form a coherent thought. “I… oh, Pip. I didn’t realize…”

Pippin kissed him, lazily, tugging at his lower lip. “Mmm-hmm. But it does seem as though you and I still both have the same problem, don’t we?” 

He thrust himself against Merry’s hip. Merry laughed. “As if I’d forgotten. I don’t think I’ve ever been as hard in my entire life.”

Pippin smiled. “I think I know just what you can do with it, too.”

Merry raised his eyebrows. “You still want me to…”

“Oh, yes.”

“How do you…”

“I’d thought about that,” Pippin said, laughing, as he grabbed a handful of pillows from above his head and raised his hips so Merry could shove them underneath him. Merry nodded approvingly. 

“Clever Pippin.”

“Well?” he asked, squirming. 

Merry laughed, but only for a moment; Pippin was looking up at him, waiting with wide eyes and that disarming innocence that, even though Merry knew it was a sham, still struck him directly in the heart.  
He had intended to be as gentle as he could manage, but Pippin made it clear quite quickly that he was having none of that. A sharp exclamation and a jerk of his hips upwards let Merry know he’d found that spot he’d discovered earlier, and Pippin’s hands, still slick with oil, were grasping at his sides, fingers digging into the soft flesh there. Merry was already far closer to the edge than he wanted to be, but Pippin seemed to understand; he reached up and grasped Merry’s hand and moved it to stroke him in rhythm with Merry’s barely controlled motions. Something in the back of Merry’s head tried to remind him that anyone who happened to be anywhere in that hall could almost certainly hear him moaning, and if they couldn’t hear that, they could definitely hear Pippin’s sharp cry as he squeezed Merry’s hand hard to tighten his grip. 

In the quiet that followed, interrupted only by uneven gasping for breath and racing pulses, Merry reached up and stroked the sweat-darkened coppery curls away from Pippin’s forehead and kissed his cheek. 

“Are you all right?”

“Of course I’m all right!” Pippin said indignantly, his eyes flying open. “I’m not a delicate little lass, you know.”

“True,” Merry agreed, studying him. “If you were a lass, I’d have to say you had the most disappointing tits I’d ever seen.”

Pippin gave him a sharp look. “I’ve got something the lasses haven’t.”

Merry laughed and kissed him. “You’ve got something nobody has, except you.”

“Oh? What’s that?”

“Me,” Merry said, kissing his other cheek. 

Pippin smiled. “Well, yes. But haven’t I always had you?”

“For as long as I can remember,” Merry admitted. 

“Well, you’ve had me just as long,” Pippin said. 

“True. But you’ve never had lasses get into fights over which one was going home with you.”

Pippin scowled at Merry. “Don’t be arrogant. It doesn’t suit you.”

“That’s a lie,” Merry said. “It suits me perfectly and you know it.”

Pippin relented and kissed him, and Merry kissed him back, and when Saradoc Brandybuck came knocking on the door in the morning and heard nothing but contented snores from within, he shook his head at the foolishness and exuberance of youth, remembering his own days of drinking too much at parties and refusing to get up till noon the next day, and let the lads sleep a while longer.


End file.
